Interestingly, McEnany didn’t blame Psaki so much as she blamed Joe Biden, according to Fox News and she said that she wished Psaki the best in her job.

McEnany told the hosts at Fox and Friends that because President Donald Trump had so much transparency and she always was able to know where he stood, that she didn’t have to “circle back” because of it.

“I always knew where my boss stood. Unlike other press secretaries who maybe didn’t have walk-in privileges, I could walk in at any time … I always knew where his head was at, so I didn’t have to a ton of circling back because President Trump gave a lot of access to me.” //

She also said that of course that in the Trump Administration that they did “hours and hours of research beforehand, days sometimes.” Which sort of explains her well-organized, extensive briefing book that she could always rely on to have answers to questions. Jen Psaki doesn’t seem to have that same ability or well-researched resource, which is why she often seems left flailing for an answer. //

But it says everything about the difference between Trump and Biden. You always knew how Trump thought and he’d tell you, good, bad or indifferent what he thought about things. But with Biden, you’ll hear only a limited packaged for the PR soundbite and then he’ll do whatever the heck he or the folks behind him want

Back in February 2013, Fox’s James Rosen asked the State Department’s Victoria Nuland if the Obama Administration had been holding secret talks with Iran. Nuland denied it. //

So later in the year after it became obvious that that was in fact a lie and that they had been holding secret talks, Rosen asked then State Department spokesperson Jen Psaki about it.

QUESTION: Is it the policy of the State Department, where the preservation or the secrecy of secret negotiations is concerned, to lie in order to achieve that goal?

MS. PSAKI: James, I think there are times where diplomacy needs privacy in order to progress. This is a good example of that. . . //

Fox then later discovered that exchange between Psaki and Rosen then mysteriously edited out from the video on the State Department’s official website and Youtube channel. Eight minutes including that part and other comments on the Iran Deal were replaced with a white-flash effect.

The Obama Administration initially denied it was deliberate, blaming it on a “glitch.” But they later were forced to admit that the very same day of the comments, a video editor got a call from a State Department official to eliminate that portion of the briefing from the video. //

But the ACLJ, through their FOIA efforts in the whole matter, were able to discover an email from Jen Psaki with information relevant to the lie about Iran and when the secret negotiations actually started. But it’s so redacted it’s hard to tell what it says. So the ACLJ is requesting an unreacted version. The Biden State Department is refusing to turn it over, claiming security reasons.

Now a federal judge has ordered that the Biden State Department has to turn it over to the court by March 12, 2021.

Leaked Federal Report Concludes That Preserving Freedom of Speech Online Does NOT Cause So-Called 'Hate Crimes'
By Michael Thau | Mar 03, 2021 5:45 PM ET

(AP Photo/J. David Ake, File)
Breitbart got their hands on an unreleased report that the U.S. Department of Commerce sent to Congress in January which found zero evidence that online free speech causes so-called “hate crimes” —or, translating Orwellian newspeak to English: crimes against those in the upper echelons of the neo-liberal intersectional hierarchy committed by those belonging to lower castes.

But, whatever you want to call it, violence is violence. And one can understand why Breitbart’s sources say they “suspect that bureaucrats and establishment politicians with a vested interest in the “hate crimes” panic are trying to suppress it.” //

But the data from which the report draws this conclusion is so straightforward and compelling that it’s even crazier that no one considered it before

Apple released the first iPhone in 2007. Since then, the gradually increasing ubiquity of smartphones by itself has massively increased the amount of chatting people do online.

Factor in the general increase in internet access and prevalence of email, social media, and a host of other new ways to converse online, and there’s no question that doing so has positively exploded over the past decade.

Yet from 2009 to 2019, federal data indicates that we haven’t seen any concomitant increase in the number of “hate crimes” reported. It’s remained stable despite the vast increase in online speech.

Moreover, the report doesn‘t mention that one would expect ‘hate crime’ numbers to have increased even independently of the explosion of online communication given how much more aware of the concept we’ve become in the last decade. //

But the fact that the numbers reported remained stable during a time of expansive internet growth and markedly raised awareness is about as close to “Boom, QED, Game Over” as you’re going to get.

Finally, this report turns out to be an update of one from 1993 that also drew the very same conclusion. //

https://www.slideshare.net/AllumBokhari/ntia-hate-crimes-report-january-2021/1

The generally higher cost of renewables has had a discernible effect: the bulk of global renewable-energy spending is concentrated in high-watt countries even though electricity demand in those countries is generally flat or declining. For instance, in both the U.S. and Germany, electricity production in 2017 was roughly the same as it was 2004. Meanwhile, in the no-watt and unplugged countries — where electricity is scarce and demand for electricity is booming — spending on renewables lags far behind that of electricity-rich countries.
In 2016, global investment in renewable energy projects totaled some $242 billion. Of that some $106 billion, or 43 percent, was spent in Europe and the US. China spent another $78 billion. Thus, the U.S., Europe, and China together accounted for more than 75 percent of all global spending on renewables. //

Meanwhile, spending on solar and wind in Africa, the Middle East, and India totaled just $17 billion. //

What would it take solely to keep up with the growth in global electricity demand by using solar energy? We can answer that question by looking at Germany which has more installed solar-energy capacity that any other European country, about 42,000 megawatts. In 2017, Germany’s solar facilities produced 40 terawatt-hours of electricity. Thus, just to keep pace with the growth in global electricity demand, the world would have to install 14 times as much photovoltaic capacity as now exists in Germany, and it would have to do so every year. //

While cost, storage, and scale are all significant challenges, the most formidable obstacle to achieving an all-renewable scenario is simple: there’s just not enough land for the Bunyanesque quantities of wind turbines and solar panels that would be needed to meet such a goal. The undeniable truth is that deploying wind energy and solar energy at the scale required to replace all of the energy now being supplied by nuclear and hydrocarbons would require covering state-sized chunks of territory with turbines and panels. //

From a practical on-the-ground standpoint, the power density of wind energy will forever be stuck at 0.5 to 1 watt per square meter.

In 2015, at the UN Climate Change Conference in Paris, Ken Caldeira, a climate scientist at the Carnegie Institution for Science who was one of the co-authors of the 2013 letter, reiterated his belief that nuclear must be part of any emissions-reduction effort. “The goal is not to make a renewable energy system. The goal is to make the most environmentally advantageous system that we can, while providing us with affordable power,” Caldeira said. “And there’s only one technology I know of that can provide carbon-free power when the sun’s not shining and the wind’s not blowing at the scale that modern civilization requires. And that’s nuclear power.” //

By the mid-2020s, the US could prematurely retire as much as a third of its installed nuclear capacity. What’s driving the retirements? Low-cost natural gas is a major factor. In addition, nuclear plants must compete in the wholesale market with heavily subsidized electricity produced from wind and solar. Add in aging reactors, post-Fukushima regulations, and the never-ending opposition from big environmental groups, and the US nuclear sector has been taking a beating.
The closure of these plants has been cheered by the well-funded opponents of nuclear energy. For decades, nuclear energy’s foes have relied on three main criticisms to justify their opposition: radiation, waste, and cost. //

The facts show that the accident at Fukushima led to exactly two deaths. About three weeks after the tsunami hit the reactor complex, the bodies of two workers were recovered at the plant. They didn’t die of radiation. They drowned. //

In 2013, the UN’s Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation released a report which found that “No radiation-related deaths have been observed among nearly 25,000 workers involved at the accident site. Given the small number of highly exposed workers, it is unlikely that excess cases of thyroid cancer due to radiation exposure would be detectable in the years to come.” (Thyroid cancer is among the most common maladies caused by excessive exposure to radiation.) The UN committee was made up of 80 scientists from 18 countries. //

the one thing that we have learnt from both Chernobyl and Fukushima is that it actually wasn’t radiation that’s done the health damage to the people in the surrounding areas. It’s their fear of radiation. There’s been far more psychological damage than there has actually physical damage because of the two accidents.”

JACKSONVILLE, Ark. — The Minute Man restaurant has a special new food truck that will be coming to the Jacksonville location at 120 John Harden Drive.

The Space Shuttle Cafe will arrive at 8 AM Thursday. .

The Space Shuttle café is a converted DC-3 airplane that saw service in WW II in 1944. It is the only road-worthy DC-3 airplane licensed for street use in the world. //

After WW II, the plane saw service as a commercial airliner on the East Coast including Argonaut Airways, based in Miami, FL.

In 2015, the vehicle was upgraded to a full commercial food-service kitchen for use in the New York Metro area.

Minute man Restaurants purchased the vehicle in 2021 with plans to support its growing fleet of mobile restaurants and trailers in Arkansas, as well as promote the Minute Man Foundation’s not-for-profit mission to reduce hunger in the state.

In his January 27 “Executive Order on Tackling the Climate Crisis at Home and Abroad,” US President Joseph Biden declares that his administration aims at “putting the climate crisis at the center of United States foreign policy and National Security.” //

implication, Biden’s executive orders make the release of CO2 in any corner of the world into a US national security issue. The forthcoming National Intelligence Estimate would provide the basis for using the resources of the US intelligence community and national security apparatus to enforce administration climate policies on a global scale. //

That has ominous implications. The construction of a new highway, pipeline, factory or power plant in a developing country, which might lead to increased CO2 emissions, could in principle be classified as a threat to US national security.

Depending on the case, the US administration would thereby feel justified or even compelled to stop such projects. Green imperialism thus becomes a duty of the US government. One should consider the magnitude of the interventions and conflicts which may result. //

Climate goals provide ample justification for strong interventions into the domestic politics of nations, including support for selected parties, social movements and NGOs.

Naturally, everything will be done with 100% political correctness. Moreover, Biden evidently regards it as his prerogative, in the name of saving the planet, to dictate to other nations which projects they may or may not finance and build. //

Biden has made it clear that China is the number one target of his climate-leveraged foreign policy. China has over 250 gigawatts (GW) of coal-fired power now in development, with 97 GW already under construction. The 250 GW total is roughly equivalent to the entire coal power capacity of the US, which Biden has pledged to shut down.

First in a four-part exclusive Asia Times interview with renowned physicist and Big Bang theory critic Eric Lerner
By JONATHAN TENNENBAUM

The Big Bang is probably the most famous scientific theory since Einstein’s relativity. The Big Bang theory says that our Universe began with a gigantic explosion, about 14 billion years ago, and has been expanding and cooling down ever since.

Until relatively recently this theory has been regarded as the foundation of modern cosmology, the branch of science devoted to the study of the Universe as a whole.

But not all scientists agree with the Big Bang theory, and some even say it is completely wrong and contradicted by a growing mountain of evidence. In fact, in recent years one hears more and more talk about a “crisis of cosmology.”

I am talking now to one of the most well-known, outspoken critics of the Big Bang, the American physicist Eric J Lerner.

Advanced designs in various development stages promise to remedy the drawbacks of conventional nuclear energy

One should bear in mind that, from 1 kilogram of enriched uranium, present-day light water reactors (LWRs) can produce the energy equivalent of roughly 150,000 kilograms of coal. A uranium-breeder reactor can derive from 1 kg of natural uranium the equivalent of over 1 million kilograms of coal. A similar ratio applies to thorium in a thorium breeder reactor. //

Could nuclear power be expanded rapidly enough to eliminate the use of fossil fuels for electricity generation in the foreseeable future? //

In a speech on national television in March 1974 French Prime Minister Pierre Messmer announced an ambitious plan to make nuclear-generated electricity the foundation of the nation’s energy system. He declared “France has not been favored by nature in energy resources…. There is almost no petroleum on our territory, we have less coal than England and Germany and much less gas than Holland…. Our great chance is electrical energy of nuclear origin…. We will give priority to electricity and in electricity to nuclear electricity.”

Following the Messmer Plan, France’s nuclear power expansion proceeded at a rapid pace. During the 1980s, 44 new nuclear power stations went on line – an average of 4 per year. Nearly all were standardized in design, with two basic types producing 900 and 1300 MW of electric power each. Standardization reduced costs greatly, and construction times for most of the plants were between 5 and 7 years.

In less than 15 years the percentage of electricity generated from nuclear plants rose from about 7% percent in 1975 to over 75% in 1990. //

The irony of the situation is that the environmentalist movement is to a significant extent responsible for the continued dependence on coal and gas power plants.

It is quite conceivable that we would have had practically CO2-free electricity today if it had not been for the intense campaigns against nuclear energy, mounted continuously for over half a century in the United States and Western Europe.

Although there are good reasons to be concerned about the safety of nuclear power plants – reasons we will discuss – the political opposition to nuclear energy has on the whole been characterized by ideology and hysteria rather than rationality.

In my view the rational response to the accidents in Chernobyl (1986) and Fukushima (2011) would have been to demand fundamental innovations in the design and operation of nuclear power plants – such as those I shall describe later – rather than attempting to block the development of nuclear energy altogether. //

Unfortunately, in the transition to commercial electricity production by nuclear reactors, most of the innovative reactor designs developed in the early period, were dropped in favor of a single basic type: the light water reactor (LWR). Here the starting point in the West was the successful US Navy program to develop reactors to power submarines. Other reactor types, such as so-called fast breeder reactors, have so far played only a marginal role.

In retrospect the fixation on LWRs as the mainstay of civilian nuclear energy, to the virtual exclusion of other types, was a mistake. The main reason was cost-cutting in the field of R&D, more than intrinsic advantages of LWR reactors. Through lack of developed alternatives, nuclear energy became stuck with the limitations of LWRs. We need to correct this.

Nuclear energy, to start with, is ultimately not safe, and the Germans have always been particularly uneasy with it. After the nuclear accident at the Fukushima nuclear plant in Japan in 2011, Chancellor Angela Merkel ordered the “Atomausstieg,” the exit from nuclear energy once and for all. Why? Because, as Ms. Merkel put it back then: “The residual risk of nuclear energy can be accepted only if one is convinced that — as far as it is humanly possible to judge — it won’t come to pass.” After Fukushima, Ms. Merkel, a trained physicist, was no longer able to believe that a nuclear disaster would not occur. That there was a catastrophe even in a high-tech country like Japan made her change her mind.

But what about the near-certain catastrophic consequences of the second evil, climate change enhanced by coal-fired plants? Ms. Merkel recognized recently that “climate change is happening faster than we had thought a couple of years ago.” At the same time, she had to admit that Germany was struggling to fulfill the promises of the Paris climate accord: Despite new hopeful figures, the targeted 40 percent reduction of carbon emissions by the end of 2020 may not be met. One could argue that knowledge about the severity of climate change has deepened since 2011 and that countries should do everything they can to shift away from fossil fuels — yet there’s no sign that Ms. Merkel might change her mind about scrapping nuclear. //

The tragedy about Germany’s energy experiment is that the country’s almost religious antinuclear attitude doesn’t leave room for advances in technology. Scientists in America, Russia and China believe that it is possible to run nuclear power plants on radioactive waste — which might solve the problem of how to store used fuel elements, one of the core arguments against nuclear. Certainly, these so-called fast breeder reactors have their dangers too. But as we transition to a completely renewable energy supply, wouldn’t they be a better alternative to coal and gas plants? //

By shutting down its entire nuclear sector in a rush, Germany loses more opportunities than dangers. It forfeits the capacity to connect to a technology that might prove the safest and most climate-friendly mankind has yet seen. At the very least, using Germany’s existing nuclear plants would make an expeditious move away from fossil fuels possible.

Is it irrational not to do so? Maybe, maybe not. But letting this chance slip away could turn out to be one of the gravest mistakes of the Merkel era.

Tom Elliott
@tomselliott
Biden on when America might return to normal: “My hope is by this time next year” //

“I’ve been cautioned not to give an answer to that,” Biden says, again saying the quiet part out loud. Cautioned by who? Who’s telling him what to do? And shouldn’t he know that yes, obviously, one can’t give a definitive. But then his answer seems to have no connection to present reality, with him saying, “My hope is that by this time next year we’ll be back to normal or before that — my hope. But it depends upon if people continue to be smart”

The first thing I noticed upon arrival and all the way through until I handed the valet his gratuity, hopped in my truck and headed home, was that everyone there was happy. They were glad to be there, to be part of what candidate Trump had first discovered into and what President Trump had tapped into and grown to vibrant vitality. They were excited and joyful. You could tell by the ambient noise level throughout the 3 day event. The excitement was palpable. //

want to focus on this unity thing. There was a lot of talk, especially by the pundits about unity. “Can the Republican Party unify?” was the question intoned by oh-so-serious pundits and political prognosticators of every political persuasion. Just what does that mean?

Thinking of that reminded me of the movie The Princess Bride. Throughout the movie, the “bad guy,” named Vizzini is continually saying words to the effect of, that’s inconceivable! Finally, the hero, Inigo Montoya responds You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means. See video clip below. //

Unify the Republican Party? I’m all for it. But I don’t think that means what the establishment thinks it means.

Stay tuned

Added Bonus: Inigo Montoya was also known as a personal networking expert. Here is a sample his simple process for meeting other professionals in his line of work.

Polite Greeting: Hello.
Name: My name is Inigo Montoya.
Relevant Personal Link: You killed my father.
Manage Expectations: Prepare to die.

Simple. Effective.

See the video below

“I will not vote to pack the courts. I think — and I will not vote to end the filibuster. Bret, this system, the Senate, this so unique body in the world, it was made to work together in a bipartisan way. And once you start breaking down those barriers, then you lose every reason that we are the institution that we are, the most deliberative body.” //

Manchin isn’t the only Democrat with this position, as he’s also joined by Arizona Senator Krysten Sinema.

So if Biden is cancelling mention of Seuss, when can we cancel mention of Joe Biden? We can point to all his racist remarks over the years, including his more recent remarks about “you ain’t black” if you don’t know to vote for him and about “Hispanic and African-American” people having trouble knowing how to get online to register for the Wuhan coronavirus vaccine. //

Rich Lowry
@RichLowry
Let’s definitely begin airbrushing from history the author who has brought delight to countless millions of children, and helped open the way for them to the world of reading and books.

How stupid, humorless, and disturbing

https://nypost.com/2021/03/02/biden-removes-mention-of-dr-seuss-from-read-across-america-day/?utm_source=twitter_sitebuttons&utm_medium=site%20buttons&utm_campaign=site%20buttons via @nypost
Biden removes mention of Dr. Seuss from ‘Read Across America Day’
nypost.com

“I’m sure there are other journalists out there who feel the same way. I found myself reading news copy that I didn’t believe was fully truthful, or only told part of the story. And I began to feel that I was contributing to the fear and division in this country by continuing on in this profession.” //

Lake told Arizona Daily Independent that the COVID pandemic was her breaking point.

“It really got difficult for me when Covid hit. I felt the stories I was reading were not fully truthful. The cancel mob’s insistence that certain Covid-related stories not be told or even whispered, while others were told over-and-over made me feel as if I was not giving a balanced view of the situation to viewers.”

We wrote our first story at the New York Times about a possible partnership between Merck and J&J for manufacturing on January 21st, that was when it published. So, in my understanding is that talks between those companies had been in the works before that even in terms of sort of the corporate discussions between them. So could you help explain how it is that the Biden administration deserves credit for bringing these two together when it looks like the discussions had been underway long before you guys got here.”

The outcome of Brnovich — if the Arizona statutes are upheld as not violating Section 2 — will provide the “go-ahead” to conservative state legislatures to adopt “ballot integrity” legislation prior to 2022 and 2024 with confidence that the Supreme Court will sustain such legislation so long as the statutes are race-neutral even if they have what some consider a disproportionate impact on minority voters.

The Supreme Court’s role in the judiciary is to chart the course or lower courts to follow — not to step into an electoral maelstrom and attempt to sort out the claims of the competing parties on incomplete and contradictory factual records.

Potentially the two biggest issues that will be directly implicated by the outcome of today’s case will be the degree to which states are going to be allowed to require voter identification and engage in signature matching on absentee ballots without worrying about Democrat lawyers like Marc Elias trying to tie up the election process in court proceedings raising due process and Voting Rights Act claims.

A belching coal plant is easy to identify as a probable greenhouse gas polluter. Coal emissions are point source pollution—like a chemical spill in a stream, the pollution can be traced back to a specific activity at a precise place.

But is measuring the carbon produced at a power plant the best way to monitor emissions? A team of scientists recently took a different approach to estimating carbon dioxide: the bottleneck method. Instead of considering the pollution emitted only at the end use, burning phase of fossil fuel use, the researchers considered all phases: mining, transport, refining, and burning.

Their study identified the worst emissions offenders, and the results were surprising: oil and gas pipelines. The researchers noted that the companies enabling greenhouse gases emissions are most at risk of climate mitigation lawsuits. //

The bottleneck analysis showed that 9 of the top 10 carbon polluters were oil and gas pipelines (47% and 44%, respectively), while a coal mine took the remaining spot in the top rankings. In comparison, point source methods revealed that the top 10 polluters were oil pipelines (eight spots) and coal mines. //

For natural gas, the biggest emissions came from pipeline transport. The sheer length of pipelines—the Transcontinental Gas Pipeline (Transco) alone branches into more than 16,900 kilometers (10,500 miles) of pipeline from Texas to New York—means there are lots of places to emit gas.

“Especially for older pipelines and pipeline networks, you get leaking. And methane is a pretty severe greenhouse gas,” said Pearce. He noted that fixing or not fixing leaks can be an economic decision for pipeline owners—minor leaks might cost more to repair than the loss of gas into the air.

One of the most highly regarded books of the 20th century was Ernest Becker’s “The Denial of Death.” Winner of the 1974 Pulitzer Prize, the book is regarded as a classic for its analysis of how human beings deny their mortality.

But there is something people deny more than mortality: evil. Someone should write a book on the denial of evil; that would be much more important because while we cannot prevent death, we can prevent evil.

The most glaring example of the denial of evil is communism, an ideology that, within a period of only 60 years, created modern totalitarianism and deprived of human rights, tortured, starved, and killed more people than any other ideology in history. //

Why is it important that everyone know what communism did?

Here are three reasons:

First, we have a moral obligation to the victims not to forget them. Just as Americans have a moral obligation to remember the victims of American slavery, we have the same obligation to the billion victims of communism, especially the 100 million who were murdered.

Second, the best way to prevent an evil from reoccurring is to confront it in all its horror.

The fact that many people today, especially young people, believe communism is a viable—even morally superior—option for modern societies proves they know nothing about communism’s moral record. Therefore, they do not properly fear communism—which means this evil could happen again.

And why could it happen again?

That brings us to reason No. 3. The leaders of communist regimes and the vast number of people who helped those leaders torture, enslave, and murder—plus the many more people who reported on their neighbors for saying something objectionable to the communists—were nearly all normal people. Of course, some were psychopaths, but most were not. Which proves that any society—including free ones—can devolve into communism or some analogous evil. //

If you don’t hate communism, you don’t care about, much less love, people.